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Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Listing Prices Up....So What?

I recently was sent a notification from a Trulia blogger that blindly and breathlessly proclaimed that listing prices in our area are up significantly over last year.

Big deal.

Listing prices are meaningless as a measurement of the health of a real estate market. If 5 canal front homes went on the market on the same street this year, but there were only non-canal front homes for sale the year before, then yes, listing prices probably went up. Zillow in particular loves to use listing price data scraped from public websites to misinform the public about the health or weakness of real estate markets.

The Sarasota and Bradenton real estate market is thankfully healthier than our neighbors to the north and south, but regurgitating misleading or irrelevant information will only scare potential buyers away from our area if these buyers feel there are other options based solely on price.